Yakgwa (약과)

a delicious treat for chuseok (first attempt!)

It’s currently Chuseok(추석) in Korea, which is the mid-autumn harvest festival. You could think of it as Korean Thanksgiving! So I decided to make something relating to this season: yakgwa (약과)! Yak means medicine and gwa means confection. It’s one of my favorite traditional Korean snacks. I love how it combines the textures of both chewy and crispy and has a mellow sweetness. This was my very first attempt at making this confection, so I was very nervous! Haha.

This korean treat is more commonly seen in the shape of a flower. I didn’t have a mold and didn’t want to buy one just to not use it again. haha. So I made this version!

This recipe requires some specialty ingredients that you definitely need to go to an asian grocery store for. I’m not sure if they’re the same everywhere else. So I opted to buy korean versions of starch syrup and grain syrup. Also citron extract was hard to find but truthfully, I don’t think you need it in the recipe.
Soju is a Korean alcoholic beverage, traditionally made from rice, wheat, or barley.

Ingredients
I used the recipe found in this youtube video here: https://youtu.be/SR0XcN-DQ78?si=w9gV6fCbCf2gyEwD

Soaking syrup
600 grams grain syrup
150 grams water
10 grams ginger
30 grams citron extract, optional
Sugar syrup
80 grams sugar
20 grams starch syrup
100 grams water
Dough
300 grams flour
3g (1 heaping teaspoon) cinnamon
3g (3/4 teaspoon) salt
Some cracks of pepper
24 grams sesame oil
24 grams cooking oil
70g soju
63g sugar syrup, previously made
Cooking oil, for frying

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Directions

1. Soaking Syrup
   -Add 600 g grain syrup, 150 ml water and 10 g sliced ginger to a pot. Put it over high heat and bring it to a boil. Once it boils, bring the heat to low and simmer for around 5 minutes. Use a spatula or spoon to get rid of any foam that forms on the surface.
   -Add 30 g citron extract at this point. This is completely optional. Bring to a boil over medium high heat once again and then let it cool completely.

2. Sugar Syrup
   -Add 80 g sugar, 20 g starch syrup, and 100 ml water to a pot.
   -Heat on high and bring to a boil. Once the sugar is fully dissolved, remove it form the heat and let it cool completely.

3. Dough
   -Combine 300 g flour, 3 g cinnamon, 3 g salt, and a few cracks of pepper into a large bowl. Sift this mixture.
   -Then combine 24 g sesame oil with 24 g cooking oil in another bowl. Add the oils to the flour mixture and mix everything together. Then using your hands, rubs the flour and oil together. You want to thoroughly grease the flour. Then sift the oiled flour through a sieve 2-3 times.
   -Now add 70 ml soju and 63 ml sugar syrup (that we previously made) to the flour mixture to hydrate the dough. Mix it all together with a spatula using a cutting motion. Then knead a bit with your hands making sure not to overmix. Wrap your dough in plastic wrap in the shape of a square and refrigerate for around 30 minutes.
   -30 minutes later, cut your dough in half and stack in on top of the other. Roll the dough out into a rectangle. Then fold the top two thirds over the bottom and fold the bottom over completely on top. Turn and rotate the dough so that the ends are now facing top and bottom. Roll it out into a flat rectangle again. Fold it one last time like before. Turn and roll. You can watch my youtube video for a better visual of the process. Hard to describe! haha
   -Trim the edges with a knife. Then cut the dough into strips. And then the strips into squares. Use a chopstick to poke holes into the top of the squares.

4. Frying
   -Add your cooking oil to a large pot. Heat your oil on high and lower it to low/medium lwo once it reaches around 210 degrees F (100 C). Add your yakgwa pieces into the oil and make sure to gently move them so that they’re not sticking to each other. The pieces will eventually start to float to the surface.
   -Once they all float and start to brown, increase the heat to medium/medium high, around 302 degrees F (150 C). Cook until they’re sufficiently browned and then place them on a baking sheet with paper tower to drain. Let cool for a bit.

5. Soaking
   -Add your fried yakwa to the soaking syrup. You might want to remove the ginger slices at this point. Mix it all together. Then let it soak for around 45 minutes. You can even soak it overnight but I like for them to retain their crunch.
   -Transfer your soaked yakgwa to a wire rack and let them dry at room temperature for a day or so. Then enjoy!

Have you ever tried yakgwa?